The Sikkim Himalaya

ROBERT H. T. DODSON

Sikkim is a tiny, semi-autonomous state, ruled by a Maharajah and enclosing within its borders some of the highest and most spectacular parts of the Himalaya. It is a rectangle, approximately 60 miles from north to south and 45 miles from east to west. It is sandwiched between Nepal, India, Bhutan, and Tibet, with half of its entire perimeter forming a frontier with Tibet. As the government of Sikkim is virtually controlled from New Delhi, Sikkim can be regarded as a finger of India projecting into Tibet and forming a corridor between Nepal and Bhutan.

Sikkim is a topographic entity, consisting entirely of the headwaters basin of the Tista River, which is a tributary of the Ganges. On the west, north, and east, Sikkim’s frontier coincides with the watershed of the Tista. On the south, a boundary formed by British decree follows the banks of two of the Tista tributaries, flowing east and west from the watershed to the Tista. The southern half of Sikkim is rugged hill country. The Great Himalaya Range runs across the northern half. The Sikkim Himalaya is very exposed to the monsoon, with two exceptions: the northwest and northeast corners. The former is called Lhonak, a semiarid valley exposed only to weak and intermittent monsoon influences. The northeast corner is even more arid. It is plateau country similar to the Tibetan plain, and like Tibet, practically free of the monsoon. Except for these two corners, subalpine Sikkim is a land of rainy gorges covered with jungle.

Culturally, socially, and racially, Sikkim is Sino-Tibetan and not Indian. The religion is Buddhist; the architecture is Chinese; and the people (Lepchas, Bhutias, etc.) resemble Tibetans. In the north they are nomads and yakherders; in the south, rice and fruit farmers.

The great peaks of Sikkim lie in five areas:

1). The southern approaches to Kangchenjunga, in west Sikkim near the Nepal border.

2). The Zemu region, just northeast and east of Kangchenjunga.

3). The Kangchenjunga massif.

4). Lhonak, in the northwest corner of Sikkim.

5). The Tibet-like country of Northeast Sikkim.

Areas (1), (2), and (3) are exposed to the full force of the monsoon, and their peaks are therefore blanketed in snow and ice. Lhonak and Northeast Sikkim are sunnier and drier places, with more exposed rock at high altitudes.

In degree of difficulty, Sikkim peaks in all areas except the northeast are comparable with the Himalayan average. However, the peaks of Northeast Sikkim are less difficult, for their height, than the Himalayan mean. A case apart, of course, is Kangchenjunga.

The Sikkim Himalaya has been frequently visited. Of 54 peaks attempted only 10 have not been climbed. But in addition, there are probably another 10 to 20 unclimbed and unnamed peaks in Sikkim over 18.000 feet which have never been attempted. However, most of this latter category is of relatively little interest, being for the most part outliers and high points in the ridges of peaks already listed.

A unique feature of mountaineering history in Sikkim is that about 80 per cent of it took part between 1929 and 1939- Almost nothing has been done since then. In the 1930’s, Sikkim was a highly developed Himalayan playground of British India. Reasons for the great influx of climbers were several: proximity to the resort of Darjeeling; proximity to Calcutta; the attraction of Kangchenjunga, showpiece of the Himalayas, visible in all its glory from Darjeeling; and a system of well-kept and strategically placed bungalows along excellent foot-trails which permitted the traveler to penetrate the Himalaya in comparative luxury. Climbing and exploration in the Sikkim Himalaya in the thirties was almost equally divided between German expeditions, and small British parties composed of Indian employees on leave. Most of the climbing on Kangchenjunga and in the Zemu area has been done by Germans, in the other three areas by the British.

The most well-known peaks of Sikkim are: Kangchenjunga (28,146 feet), the world’s third highest summit; Siniolchu (22,620 feet) in the Zemu valley, a spectacular spire called by Douglas Freshfield "… probably the most beautiful mountain in the world”; the Jonsong Peak (24,304 feet) in the northwest corner; and Pauhunri (23,380 feet) in the northeast. The last mentioned offers one of the easiest climbs above 23.000 feet in the world.

There are at least five reasons for postwar inactivity in Sikkim:

1). Kangchenjunga, the main attraction, had proved such a formidable obstacle to previous expeditions that no one would consider attacking it while other Himalayan "Eight-Thousanders” remained unclimbed.

2).So many of Sikkim’s peaks had been climbed that not much virgin territory remained.

3).Those climbers most interested in Sikkim—the Germans—were prevented from returning by the exigencies of postwar recuperation.

4). Indian independence sapped away the adventurers, mountaineers, and athletic types from the British community in India, leaving a residue of passive individuals content to simmer in the heat of the plains.

5).Starting in 1949 and culminating in 1952, the Indian Government restricted the number and extent of permits to foreigners to visit Sikkim. This is undoubtedly due to Tibetan proximity: the fact that Sikkim’s capital town of Gangtok lies on the Lhasa trade route, and that one of China’s principal military bases in Tibet is at Yatung, only six miles from the Sikkim border. In 1952 the curtain was drawn completely for foreigners, across all of high-altitude Sikkim except for an area south of Kangchenjunga which includes only a few peaks. This writer and his companions were the last foreigners to be allowed into the now-forbidden area, in October 1952. Only two ascents of Sikkim peaks have been made since that time (Kabru—second ascent, and Kangchenjunga), and both were climbed from their Nepal sides. However, if relaxation of East-West tension continues, it is likely that Sikkim will be opened once again to foreign mountaineers.

If so, a Sikkim expedition would have much to offer. The foothill country and its people are delightful. Travel is relatively luxurious, due to bungalows at the lower levels, and the scenery is spectacular, even by Himalayan standards. Douglas Freshfield found in Sikkim "… the most beautiful mountain in the world.” It was Dr. Kellas, the Sikkim climber, who called mountaineering "… the most philosophical sport in the world.” Sir John Hunt has made a word synthesis of Freshfield’s beauty and Kellas’ philosophy: Reminiscing in 1950, he recalled his impressions of a climb in 1937 when he stood, as this writer has done after him, and watched "… incredibly far below, the great ice stream of the Zemu twisting toward the mist-filled glens of Sikkim”: —"What do I remember now, as I think back across the gap of 13 years to those moments of great living in a distant land? —I remember the stillness and the majesty of the scene, I remember the wind—, I remember clinging for dear life with ice-axe and crampons—, I remember pausing on an immense white slope—, But I remember most, and shall ever evoke, that sense of peace, transcending human care and the violence of the wind, which reigns in those lonely places. A peace whose element is Beauty, raising the spirit of man above his baser self toward the Eternal.”